Postage meter devices have found wide application in many businesses. The device prints a standard unit of value for governmental or private carrier delivery of parcels and mail. It is understood that the term "postage meter" also includes other like devices which provide a unit value metering capability.
One of the chief disadvantages of the postage meter devices as they are utilized today is the problem of recharging the postage meter with funds to be metered. At present, postal regulations require that the funds be prepaid before metering commences. This requirement results in a postage meter being physically taken to a post office facility for recrediting or there being means for obtaining a remote recrediting of the meter device.
Various schemes have been devised and implemented to obtain the desired remote recrediting based on information from a remote accounting station. Typical configurations are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,792,446 to McFiggans, et. al. entitled "REMOTE POSTAGE METER RESETTING METHOD" and in U.S. Pat. No. 4,097,923 to Eckert, Jr., et. al. entitled "POSTAGE METER CHARGING SYSTEM USING AN ADVANCED MICROCOMPUTERIZED POSTAGE METER". These patents teach a data center which is equipped with a programmed digital computer and a voice answer-back unit to process telephone calls from users of postage meters equipped either with a combination lock such that the lock prohibits recharging of the associated meter until it is unlocked or, in the case of U.S. Pat. No. 4,097,923, of a working memory which contains a seed number for generating postage funding combinations to unlock the meter. The remote system of the latter patent includes the capability of adding variable amounts of postage to the postage meter. The teaching of U.S. Pat. No. 3,792,446 relate only to the addition of a fixed increment to the meter.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,255,439 to Simjian discloses a system in which the meter communicates directly to a central accounting station for accounting for each and all of the metering operations either on a real time basis or in batches. Similar systems are disclosed for instance in West German Patent Application No. DE 2636852 published Feb. 23, 1978 in which a data transmitting unit is employed to recharge the postage meter by way of telephone or telegraph lines. U.K. Application No. 2,147,853 published May 22, 1985 further discloses a telephone integrated with a mail franking device which will operate as either a telephone or a postage meter. The telephone key pad may used to set postal values and it is disclosed that the accounting may be done either in the device or in a central accounting unit.
Each of the devices is limited in that there are required a number of complex operations in order for the user of the postage meter to assure that there are funds in the meter to be dispensed. In every case in the known postage meters, where the meter funds are required to be updated, it is up to the user to realize that the funds in the meter are low and that the user should initiate a telephone call or take the meter to the Post Office in order to recredit the meter. In many cases, a low funds event may occur as the user is in the midst of a mailing run. Because the prior art devices typically have a lock-out feature to prevent meter operation when the funds get too low, the user is unable to continue with postage metering operations. In such cases, the user experiences dissatisfaction because one of the reasons for utilizing the remote recharging features of the postage meter is to eliminate the problem of having to go to the Post Office and to be able to obtain postage as needed.
Another difficulty in present postage meters is the general lack of convenient economical means for determining the rate of usage of the postage meters.